Tag Archives: Renee Geyer

Before Joss Stone and before Amy Winehouse there was Renee Geyer. Her voice was discovered when she sang an impromptu number with a Sydney bar band in 1971. Though tortured by stage fright, she was quickly put into a studio with some of Melbourne’s crack musicians and her first album released. In 2013 she issued her 25th and is about to embark on a national tour.

“I do rhythm and blues,” Renee explained in an interview. “This genre of music picked me. I didn’t pick it. From a very early age I was listening to it on my transistor radio under my pillow. At fourteen or fifteen years of age I knew that this was the music I connected with.”

By 1975 her reputation as an exceptionally evocative and versatile soul singer took her to the US where she hooked up with Motown producer Frank Wilson who worked with Renee on Movin’ Along. The record was a hit in Australia and loved by R&B stations in the States as well but when DJs found out this hot voice belonged to a white Jewish Aussie they didn’t know quite how to promote it. Renee continued working in the States till 1980 when she moved home where she kept on singing and recording. Along the way she created an unassailable position as one of Australia’s most revered pop stars. With R&B cogniscenti and collectors, Renee Geyer ranks as one of the great all time blue-eyed soul voices.

Renee’s signature songs are Man’s World, Foggy Highway and Difficult Woman, the last being the name of her memoirs as well. Indeed, like that other white Jewish female named Amy, Renee has lived a full and often difficult life. Listen to the lyrics of Difficult Woman and you’ll get her perspective on it all.

With a new, very well received record of jazz covers in the stores and a tour set to begin,this is the perfect time to share a collection of her greatest recordings. (note the last track has some distortion).